


You Are Unse-Sek

by artino



Category: The Queen's Thief - Megan Whalen Turner
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-11
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-17 07:48:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29346912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artino/pseuds/artino
Summary: Costis wondered if a prayer to Miras was worth anything from a man who sold the god's ring, wasted the money, and threw away his sword like a coward.Chapter 6 of Thick as Thieves: Kamet and Costis are captured by the slavers, from Costis' point of view.
Relationships: Kamet & Costis Ormentiedes
Comments: 3
Kudos: 12





	1. Chapter 1

The slavers' leader, Shef, reached for his sword, and Costis cursed himself for a fool.

He should never have listened to Kamet. He should never have let Kamet hide his sword and armor. Bad enough that Costis had failed his king. But now he was going to be cut down, murdered in the middle of nowhere with the man he was supposed to be protecting—and he couldn't even put up a fight.

Precious seconds were slipping away. Costis thought about the trick he had seen the King do, and wondered if he could take Shef's sword out of his hand by grabbing the blade. Even as he formed the thought, he knew it was impossible. The King pulled off that trick because he practiced it. If Costis tried—without having ever practiced—he would maim his hand for nothing.

He was shifting his weight, thinking he should just lunge at Shef and hope for the best, when Kamet stumbled. One moment he was at Costis' side—and the next, he was in front of him, his body blocking Costis' path to the slaver. It was not clumsiness. Just like that, their last chance to fight was gone.

Costis let out an angry breath. Stubborn, Kamet leaned into him, nudging him backwards, still acting like he was just finding his footing. Then he took a half step towards Shef. 

Kamet bowed his head, already crying a little, and spun his story in Mede phrases so simple that even Costis could understand every word. 

Watching him, Costis could see how tense his shoulders were. He's nervous about the lie, Costis thought—and suddenly felt more nervous himself.

Kamet stuttered a little over his words. He was getting more convincing as he went along. 

One of the slavers snickered, and Costis felt bile rise in his throat. He wasn't sure if the man was laughing at him or at the ridiculous sight of Kamet, now fully committed to the part of the eager, anxious slave. It was like a scene out of the broadest, worst kind of comedy—much worse than Senabid. Costis hadn't understood everything at the play they saw, but he knew the audience was supposed to be on Senabid's side. No. This reminded Costis more of a scene from a Sounisian play he had seen in Attolia years ago, where the whole point was to laugh at the slave.

Someone in Costis' squad had bought the tickets, and they had all gone drinking after. Costis had laughed along with everyone else.

And now Kamet was cringing in front of him, acting like the punch line of a bad joke and not like himself at all. Costis closed his eyes. He pictured Kamet bathed in moonlight, sitting with his spine perfectly straight, tapping his lip out of respect for his gods. Costis could not think of any sight more beautiful.

He opened his eyes, half expecting the slavers to see through Kamet's act after all.

Of course they didn't.

If anyone had any doubts, Kamet ended them when Shef hit him and he fell with a shocked gasp, completely unlike the dangerous fugitive the slavers thought they were hunting. Costis followed his lead as best he could, forcing himself not to fight back when they shoved him to the ground. But he couldn't bring himself to hide the anger on his face.

I am just being realistic, he thought, glaring at the man who kicked him. If Costis were really a runaway field hand, he would be at least this angry.

The slavers tied them both with the same rope. They looped it around Costis' wrists and neck first, making sure he was secure before they tied Kamet. The knots were sloppy. Costis thought he could probably undo them with his teeth, if he had enough time and no one was looking—but his wrists were already chafing and he hoped the slavers wouldn't take them very far before they untied him.

Be careful what you wish for, he thought, as they hustled him and Kamet back down the path at a speed Costis could barely keep up with. He wasn't surprised when Kamet stumbled and fell in front of him. There wasn't enough slack in the rope. Kamet's slight weight almost pulled Costis down, too.

Costis struggled to find his balance, and the King's earring clacked against his tooth. He had almost forgotten it was in his mouth. Kamet fell again, and Costis tried to focus on nothing but his own feet—and keeping his jaw clamped shut.

Focusing didn't do him any good. The man behind him, for no reason Costis could fathom, aimed a sharp kick at the back of Costis' knee, and his leg went out from under him.

He toppled forward, caught himself badly, and got a face full of gravel. The fastener on the King's earring stabbed into the flesh under his tongue. He barely stopped himself from spitting it out. He wanted to open his mouth to gasp for air, but he forced himself to breathe through his nose instead, trying not to gag on his own blood. He stayed down as long as he dared, trying to maneuver the earring into a more comfortable part of his mouth.

He wondered if a prayer to Miras was worth anything from a man who sold the god's ring, wasted the money, and threw away his sword like a coward.

The man who knocked him down in the first place was kicking at him again—this time to get him up. Costis snarled at him as he struggled to his feet, but the man just laughed, dancing away out of his reach.

Costis watched him warily. The man was young. He looked about the same age as Kamet—just a few years older than Costis. The red of his jacket was faded from dirt and the sun, but it looked expensive and official, like maybe it had once been part of a military uniform. Costis wondered if he was a deserter, or if he just murdered a soldier and took his clothes.

Ahead of them, Kamet fell for a third time.

Costis winced, wishing he could go to him and help him up. The man in the soldier's jacket said something Costis couldn't quite catch.

Costis replayed the sounds in his head, but he still didn't understand. He glanced back at the man, trying to puzzle it out.

They locked eyes. The man leered, his meaning unmistakable.

Kamet had warned him. "Don't look anyone in the face," he had said.

Costis looked backed down at the dirt and tried to think about nothing.

By the time they made it down to the slavers' camp, Costis was exhausted. His every instinct was screaming at him to fight or to run. He hated Kamet's plan—if it could even be called a plan, and not just a horrible, stupid mistake—but he knew there was nothing he could do except play along for now.

He tried to distract himself by thinking about the embarrassing report he would have to make to Teleus, when they finally escaped the Empire and made it back home to Attolia. He wondered if Teleus would take the cost of his armor out of his pay. Costis was so busy feeling sorry for himself that when he caught his first glimpse of their fellow captives, chained together around the edges of the camp, it took him a few seconds to understand what he was seeing.

He stepped back in horror.

It was common knowledge, even to a foreigner like Costis, that when slaves were sent to the Emperor's mines, they were worked to death. He knew it was dangerous, backbreaking work. But Costis would have thought, since the work was so awful, that you had to start out with men who could stand up well enough to hold an axe, or push a wagon, or carry a load. But not a single one of the men he saw could have survived a day of hard labor. Some of them looked ready to die where they sat.

He turned to Kamet, trying to catch his eye, expecting to see his horror mirrored in Kamet's face. But Kamet's face was a mask—perfectly calm and expressionless. He glanced at the chained men as if he did not really see them. Then he blinked, dismissively, and didn’t look again—at them, or at Costis.

Costis shivered.

He thought about how it had been when they first met. How agonizing, to be cooped up in that horrible cabin on the Anet's Dream with a complete stranger who acted like he hated Costis, even though the entire point of Costis being there was to help him escape. Kamet's face had been blank then, too.

The slavers untied Kamet first. He still wouldn't look at Costis. He dropped down on the rocky ground before they could knock him over again, and he put his own foot into the manacle so they could hammer it shut around his ankle. He didn't watch as they manhandled Costis into place next to him.

After they untied the rope, Costis rubbed his bruised wrists and tried to listen in on their captors' conversation. It sounded like they were speaking Mede, but their words were garbled. Costis couldn't understand anything.

It's just nerves, he thought. Shock. He just needed to listen better. But even his rudimentary understanding of Mede was better than this. Costis was listening as hard as he could, but he couldn't understand anything at all.

Kamet usually spoke Attolian to him, out of politeness. Or maybe he couldn't be bothered parsing the stupid mistakes Costis made when he spoke Mede. Kamet's Attolian was practically perfect, although Costis would lay money that Kamet learned some of his vocabulary out of books that were already old when their grandparents were children. And his aristocratic accent made him sound like a snob.

But even with no more than occasional practice, Costis' Mede had gotten a lot better. He had understood everything Kamet had told the slavers. He had understood what they said when they replied to Kamet. But now that he thought about it, now that he frantically tried to replay, again, what the man in the faded soldier's jacket had said to him on the walk down to the camp, he couldn't figure it out.

Shef and Kepet were having a loud, articulate shouting match by the fire, and Costis had absolutely no idea what they were talking about.

He turned to Kamet and saw that he was listening, too—but still with such a blank expression that Costis couldn't tell if he understood their language or not. When Kamet looked back at him, finally, he must have seen the alarm in Costis' face.

Kamet's blank glance softened a little. He nodded towards a spot on the other side of the campsite, and when Costis looked, he saw that one of the leg manacles was empty.

That must be what Shef and Kepet were fighting about. Someone had escaped. Costis tried not to be too hopeful. He told himself it was probably bad luck for him and Kamet—their captors would be more on guard now, and the two of them would have to be even more careful.

Even so, he breathed a sigh of relief for the stranger who had managed to run away.

Kamet met his gaze again, and they both shifted a little from their places so they could sit closer together. Something was cooking over the fire, and Costis' mouth started to water at the exact moment he realized that he and Kamet were not going to be allowed to eat whatever it was.

Kamet looked at him, the way he always did right before he rolled his eyes—like he wanted credit for being polite, even though it was obvious Costis was being laughed at.

"Not nearly as tasty as grilled rodent," Costis whispered. He didn't care if Kamet made fun of him, as long as he was acting more like himself.

Kamet didn't roll his eyes the way Costis thought he would. He smiled instead—just for a few seconds, while Costis smiled back at him like an idiot. Then Kamet ducked his head and the blank expression returned.

Costis wasn't sure if that brief smile made him feel better or worse.

They went back to silently watching their captors. Costis' heart wasn't in it. He was thinking about Kamet. It was a little sad, the way their friendship was somehow on its most stable footing when they were joking about eating rats. Some of their jokes weren't bad, though. He thought about the time Kamet had made fun of him when Costis was cleaning caggi for their dinner, a few days before they had sold Kamet's slave chain.

"You are Unse-Sek to the rodents," Kamet had said, as Costis peeled one of the caggi out of its skin, gutted it, and set it aside to skewer later. At first, Costis hadn't been sure if it was a joke or if Kamet was just being mean for no reason. But Costis gave into a silly impulse and waved his hands in the air like they were claws, and Kamet's mocking smile had melted away and he had laughed like a child. 

Now they were sitting in the dirt with chains around their ankles, and Costis could not stop thinking about how badly he had wanted to go play tourist in Koadester, because he had thought it would make Kamet happy. Costis had thought he deserved to see something sacred and beautiful, like Ne-Malia's stepwell, before he was forced to leave his country forever. It was so unfair that the price of his freedom would be exile in Attolia—a country Kamet had been to, knew well, and hated.

Costis wished he could apologize, but he didn't know how. He had promised to help Kamet run away, and he knew that the terrible bargain Kamet had made was partly his fault. Even before Costis had gotten them captured, sometimes he was sure he could see Kamet wishing he could take it all back and just go home. Now, because Costis had not spotted the slavers in time, because he had failed to protect either of them, he had made it all so much worse.

He didn't say any of that. He just sat there beside Kamet—close enough to touch him, but not touching him. The night got darker.


	2. Chapter 2

Kepet left, then came back alone. That was good, Costis thought. The man he was looking for, the runaway, must have eluded him.

But then Kepet started kicking at the captives, waking them up one by one to show them his trophy. Costis guessed what sort of thing he must be holding before he really saw it. Kamet froze next to him, watching too.

Slowly, Kepet made his way around the circle of chained men. He drew close to Kamet, and Costis watched as Kamet looked without looking, his eyes unfocused—but nodding quickly, as though to show their captor that he understood. Kepet moved down the line one more time.

Kamet had somehow managed not to really look; but Costis stared, and could not stop staring.

Kepet was holding someone's severed hand. 

The knuckles were scraped and dirty, and the nails needed trimming. There was an old scar on the thumb. Costis wondered if the man was dead already when Kepet found him, or if Kepet had killed him.

He was almost sure the man was dead before Kepet cut his hand off. Almost. Kepet hadn't been gone very long. If he had cut off the man's hand while he was still alive, if he had left him bleeding out, everyone in the camp would surely have heard the screams. Costis could imagine exactly how the sound would have carried.

Something about his reaction was funny to Kepet, who started to laugh.

Costis could have killed him. He wanted to. He forced himself to be still, instead. When Kepet finally left him alone, Costis heard Kamet let out a very quiet breath—like he hadn't quite trusted Costis would behave himself.

Costis didn't look at him.

Time passed. Their captors had another argument. Costis' earlier panic about not being able to understand their language dulled into an anxious ache.

He wondered if Kamet had been chained like this before, when he was captured as a boy. 

Eventually Shef and one of the other slavers, the one with the red soldier's jacket, began to walk in another loop around the campsite. This time, instead of desecrating a corpse, their captors were doling out grain and water—but only after they forced each of the men to beg for it. Costis watched, dully, as the spectacle began to play out on the other side of the camp. 

When they stood in front of Kamet, Costis stared at his sandals and tried not to hear what they made him say.

Then it was his turn.

He was still sick with anger about the murdered runaway. He was sick about having to listen while they humiliated Kamet. He had thrown away his sword and armor, and he had bitten his tongue for hours like a coward—but he could not make himself say the words. He could not.

Shef and the other slaver glanced at each other, amused. Shef dropped a grain cake—not very appetizing to begin with, Costis told himself—back into the pot. 

The other slaver poured some water into the cup and drank it a sip at a time.

He was trying to make Costis look at him again.

Costis didn't take the bait. A second ago, he had been so angry. Now he just felt tired. The two men finally walked back to the fire, laughing easily with each other, as if this was all normal, and Costis put his head on his knees and closed his eyes, trying to ignore his hunger.

When Kamet nudged his shoulder, he flinched away.

"Annio," Kamet said, insistently, making up a name on the spot. Costis had given up wondering why Kamet never used his real name. If they died here, if they never made it home, Costis was never going to be called by his real name again.

"Annio, you have to eat."

He said Costis' fake name very gently.

Costis took his head out of his hands and realized that Kamet was offering him half his dinner.

Gods forgive him, the offer made Costis ashamed, not grateful. He did not want Kamet to have begged at all—and he certainly did not want Kamet to have begged for his benefit.

Costis was opening his mouth to tell Kamet, angrily, that he didn't want Kamet's dinner, but Kamet guessed what he was going to say and just looked at him with pity. 

"Don't let them see," he said. 

He pressed half the grain cake into Costis' hand and moved away. Costis told himself it would only cause a scene if he tried to give it back. And he was so hungry. Half the meager portion they had given Kamet was not very much at all. Costis put it all in his mouth at once—a mistake, because once the food was in his mouth, he had to figure out how to chew it without swallowing the King's blasted earring.

He watched Kamet pick his own half portion apart and eat it slowly to make it last. Costis had made Kamet crack a smile, earlier, with his stupid joke about the caggi. But there was no evidence of that on Kamet's face now.

Kamet was probably angry with him. Costis was playing his part so badly. Costis had made things harder for him. But if Kamet was angry, he kept it to himself. When he finished eating, Costis watched him curl into himself, as if he was trying to disappear into the rocky ground.

The sky finally darkened completely, and one of the slavers brought out a wine skin and started passing it around. Costis felt sick again, listening to their captors drink and laugh without any way to know what they were talking about. He wished he could ask Kamet to translate, but he was still not sure if Kamet understood them, either. He had turned completely away from Costis, and Costis couldn't see his face at all.

They kept talking, and laughing, and drinking. Costis began to hope that perhaps they would drink themselves to sleep. 

Then the man who had drunk Costis' water and taunted him earlier, the one with the jacket, stood up from the group and swaggered towards them. He was drinking something out of his own flask. His friends by the campfire whistled at him, and he shouted back something sarcastic over his shoulder.

A few seconds passed. He stood in front of Costis and looked him up and down. Ignoring him seemed pointless, so Costis looked up and met his eyes, deliberately this time.

His beard was very neatly kept. What a stupid thing for me to notice, thought Costis. 

Then, even stupider: he might be handsome, if he didn't look so cruel.

The man's smile widened, and Costis' mind went blank. It was very, very obvious what he wanted, and Costis did not know what to do.

The next thing he knew, Kamet was screaming in his face.

"This is all your fault. I would be safe at home if it wasn't for you."

Costis flinched. The slaver took a step back—bewildered, as Costis was, by Kamet's timing.

Costis focused on Kamet. He looked as upset as Costis had ever seen him. 

Much later, after they had escaped and climbed for hours, he would realize what Kamet had done for him. Kamet knew their language all along: they were his own countrymen, speaking his native tongue. Kamet had known exactly what was happening.

But Costis didn't know any of that right now. Fear made him stupid. He thought that Kamet had just not been paying attention.

"I'm sorry," Costis said, confused and distracted and not at all sure how Kamet wanted him to respond. But Costis did owe him an apology, and he was sorry. "You would be better off if you had stayed with—"

But Kamet didn't want his apology. Before Costis could even finish his sentence, Kamet shifted his weight and kicked him in the balls.

Costis' vision went white with pain and surprise, and he bit down hard on the King's earring—more pain. 

From where Costis lay, gasping, he saw the slaver try to strike Kamet. But Kamet dodged away, and kept on screaming at him.

Costis wondered, through his confusion, if Kamet had some kind of plan. Just a few hours ago, he had watched Kamet invent two completely new people for them to pretend to be. Was this somehow a part of that? Did he know something that Costis didn't, something that would help them escape? But if Kamet was trying to send some kind of signal, Costis had no idea what it was.

And he could not forget how he had seen Kamet panic, twice before. First, in the river, when the Anet's Dream sank. Again, on the road to Perth, when the Namreen almost killed him. 

When Kamet panicked, as far as Costis knew, he became truthful. He certainly seemed to be panicking now. Even if this was all part of some plan, Costis believed every word he said.

"I wish I had died before I listened to you."

How was Costis supposed to know he didn't mean that? They probably were going to die, horribly. And Costis could not even protect himself, let alone Kamet, or anyone else in that horrible place, because Costis had listened to him. He had trusted Kamet so completely that he had thrown all their weapons away.

Kamet told him they had never been friends. He called Costis a fucking idiot for thinking they ever could be. He said he hated Costis' ugly farmer's accent. This wasn't part of some invented drama. Costis had spent months trying to guess and second-guess what Kamet was thinking. He had tried so hard to figure him out. But now it was clear: Kamet despised him, and was finally telling him so.

But it was just as clear to Costis that Kamet must have a plan. He might be in a panic, not thinking about what he was saying, not caring how much he hurt Costis, but he wasn't stupid. He wouldn't pick a fight like this without a reason.

He must be trying to get Costis to do something.

In Attolian, so they wouldn't be understood, Costis tried to ask, "Do you want me to make it look like I am trying to kill you?" 

It was the only thing that made sense, even though it didn't really make sense. But Costis' tongue was thick, and his mouth tasted like iron. He was still winded and hoarse from how Kamet had kicked him. From the look on Kamet's face, what actually came out of Costis' mouth must have sounded closer to, "Do you want me to kill you?"

Whatever Kamet thought he said, it made him afraid. Costis could see that, and that should have stopped him. But he didn't know what else to do. He grabbed the chain between them and pulled.

Kamet's chained leg twisted under him. Costis heard him gasp as his body hit the sand. He tried to skitter backwards, but Costis kept pulling the chain, dragging him closer and closer. He wasn't yelling any more.

Any second, Costis thought, their captors would grab both of them and put an end to whatever Kamet had been trying to start. Any second now. He let the chain go slack, and Kamet got away from him again, half crawling, half stumbling, in the sand.

If Costis had really wanted to hurt him, it would have been easy to end this. Kamet must know that too. But it was so clear that Kamet's fear was real, and not an act. It was so clear that Kamet must have never trusted him at all.

The thought made Costis perversely angrier. What had Costis ever done, since they met, other than try to be kind? He pulled on the chain again, and Kamet fell again.

Someone laughed.

Costis had tried so hard to be kind, and Kamet had rebuffed him so many times. His one-word answers, when Costis tried to ask about his life. His strange behavior as they snuck out of Koadester. The way he had mistranslated things on purpose—but for no apparent reason—in Sherguz. All the times he had called Costis "master," like he thought Costis was too stupid to understand the simplest insult.

Costis was tired of playing tug of war. The next time he dragged Kamet close enough to grab him, he didn't pretend to lose his grip on the chain. Kamet was crying. Costis pinned him down but he still tried to get away. Kamet's trapped hands pushed against his chest.

Any second now, Costis thought, again. He could not understand why the slavers hadn't stopped them. Surely they all had better things to do than watch him and Kamet act out the most pathetic fight they had ever seen.

But no one reached for him. No one stopped him. He was so angry, and he didn't know what else to do. He put his hands around Kamet's throat.

Kamet's hands touched his, pulling at his fingers. He was sobbing now. Costis thought about the morning when they first met, when he grabbed Kamet's wrist to pull him out of earshot in the emperor's palace. Kamet had plucked at his fingers, one by one, quite uselessly. Costis had known Kamet didn't want to talk to him then, but he had not let go.

He could hear Kamet's breath whistling in his throat. Costis thought about how he had held him on the road to Perth, when Kamet thought he was dying. Kamet hadn't been able to breathe then, either, and it was only because he was so afraid.

Later, after their climb, when he was alone, Costis tried to tell himself he would have let go. He would have stopped.

But he would never know if that was really true, because that was when the slavers finally, finally pulled him away.


End file.
